BWI Rail Station Charging - 16 Hour Limit

I was at the BWI Rail Station garage today and noticed new signs that there is a 16 hour limit to parking at the EV charging spaces there. After 16 hours, the sign says ChargePoint will bill $2.00 per hour.

There was a Volt plugged in to one of the stations and the screen indicated it had been there for over 53 hours. That adds up to $74 in ChargePoint fees if my calculations are correct. Yikes! That driver is in for a bad surprise when they return.

These are the ChargePoint stations with a Level 1 outlet in addition to the L2. Unfortunately, they didn't space them two spots apart to take advantage of all 10 charging ports. They could have also had an exception to the 16 hour limit on weekends if the objective is to have the spots available for commuters.

I had the opportunity to use these two weeks ago when I took Amtrak up to NYC for the weekend. I left Saturday morning and returned Sunday night. I ended up parking in a regular spot because of the fee. There is a max fee- I think it's $50.

My assumption is they want to support commuter MARC traffic and not Amtrak. However, to your point Lanny I was there over a weekend and all of the slots were free. So there was supply, there was demand, and I still ended not being able to use it because of the pricing. Total fail.

Maryland is spending $1,000,000 to install charging stations at more MTA commuter rail stations like the one pictured below. Note the sign that reads "HEAD IN PARKING ONLY" The cable is not even close to reaching the charging port in a Model S.

Maryland is spending $1,000,000 to install charging stations at more MTA commuter rail stations like the one pictured below. Note the sign that reads "HEAD IN PARKING ONLY" The cable is not even close to reaching the charging port in a Model S.

Well deserved for the stupid design of the charge port in the back. I have had enough of sermons of how back-in parking is the best thing since sliced bread.

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It's in the back. Deal with it. Any company making commercial EVSEs for parking spaces has probably heard of Tesla and should know how long to make the cable. I've pulled head in to spaces with Clipper Creek, ChargePoint, and Blink J1772s and the cable reached just fine. So it can be done, unless someone is trying to save a few dollars by choosing to install a shorter cable.

Andrew has been suggesting (correctly IMO) this approach for years. Inexpensive, banks of 5-20's is the clear answer for a 5-6mph charge rate.

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The problem is the ChargePoint or other EVSE salesperson doesnt make any money telling an airport or train station they would be better off installing a lot of 120V circuits instead of their fancy, expensive, networked level 2 charging stations.

Thanks! That extension could come in handy for those sticky ICEing situations too. :smile:

Much of the money to fund the charging stations at state facilities like the commuter rail stations comes from grants provided by the Maryland Energy Administration (MEA). There is a "pilot project" of ten 120v NEMA 5-20 outlets being installed in a garage near the state legislature offices in Annapolis. The cost for the project is around $20,000 according to the MEA. I first noticed them on February 19th when I was at the House Office Building to testify for the Tesla bill. As of a few weeks ago, there were no signs reserving the ten parking spaces for EV charging and every spot was taken by an ICE car. Also, the outlets will not be available to the general public to use, only to state of Maryland employees according to the manager of the garage.

This project would have been more effective at BWI Airport's long-term parking garage in my opinion. I don't understand why MEA chose to put the outlets here where there is already two charging ports that are not always in use.

I agree that any long term parking (>24 hours) at train stations, airports, etc, should only need 110volt trickle charging. This would save money for the parking garage, reduce hogging up more needed 240v EVSE and reduce costs to drivers.

I have seen airport charging spots that were taken up by EVs not charging. Whenever I have parked in airports, I have never needed to be charging the entire time I was away. I often only needed 20-100 miles of charging, but when you are away for a few days, there is no way to allow that spot to open for others that may need charging. 110 volt outlets would reduce this issue.

An alternative is a multi-head EVSE. Single fed, but with more than one connector. 2:1, 4:1, 8:1 etc depending on the average amount of time the cars are expected to be in the spots. The EVSE would rotate through the cars. More expensive than a single EVSE but likely less than 2x, and it reduces the costs on the circuits and infrastructure. 240v is more efficient than 120v for charging. That's the bad side of 120v @ 8-12A. The overhead % is not good, so it does increase energy costs.

An alternative is a multi-head EVSE. Single fed, but with more than one connector. 2:1, 4:1, 8:1 etc depending on the average amount of time the cars are expected to be in the spots. The EVSE would rotate through the cars. More expensive than a single EVSE but likely less than 2x, and it reduces the costs on the circuits and infrastructure. 240v is more efficient than 120v for charging. That's the bad side of 120v @ 8-12A. The overhead % is not good, so it does increase energy costs.

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The Maryland Transit Administration is actually installing dual-head, power shared (6.6 kW) CT-4000 units as part of the current rollout of the $1,000,000 MEA grant funded expansion of the EV charging program at the MARC/Light Rail stations.

The units in the BWI Rail Station also have a 5-20 outlet in them but the charging units were installed, one to a parking space. With a bit of smart planning, there would be ten charging ports available to use instead of 5 or maybe 6.

To confirm what andrewket said, the info on ChargePoint says there is a $50.00 maximum fee. ChargePoint is quick to point out that they don't set the fees, that it is the biz owner, presumably Maryland Transit Administration in this case, that sets the fee and collects the money.